COMMENT: A fistful of offsets: How the (wild) west was won
Critics comparing the voluntary carbon market to the wild west are missing the point and risk undermining decades of progress on climate change, argues Renat Heuberger, CEO and co-founder of South Pole.
Read MoreCOMMENT: ART board statement regarding the integrity of HFLD credits
The risks of non-additionality of conservatively-issued High Forest, Low Deforestation carbon credits pale in comparison to the risks of losing the world’s remaining expanses of intact forests, argues the board of ART TREES crediting programme in response to recent views that such credits should not be allowed for use to offset emissions by airlines under CORSIA because they are not additional.
Read MoreCOMMENT: Are we missing the point of offsets?
The landscape for voluntary carbon offset types today is complex, with many buyers in a state of “analysis paralysis”. We need to think about the implications of a company using a carbon offset while observing the key principles that make offsetting a powerful tool, argues Lauren Mechak, Director, Program Development at ClimeCo.
Read MoreCOMMENT: Carbon markets – how to stop worrying and COPe with change
Recent actions by Indonesia and Papua New Guinea to pause the authorisation of new voluntary carbon market (VCM) credits represent the start of country level accounting impacting the VCM, as the mechanisms laid out in Article 6 of the Paris Agreement begin to be implemented, writes Sebastien Cross of ratings firm BeZero Carbon.
Read MoreCOMMENT: Statement on the credibility of HFLD credits in global carbon markets
A new crediting approach for High Forest, Low Deforestation (HFLD) jurisdictions is a credible way of incentivising the avoidance of deforestation in areas anchored by the large areas of intact forest, argue members of the Forests for Life Partnership in response to concerns raised about whether such units are appropriate for use in the CORSIA aviation offsetting mechanism.
Read MoreCOMMENT: REDD+ evolves with Verra’s changes to key methodologies
Standard-setting body Verra has proposed changes to tools for estimating emission reductions from its key REDD+ project types that will ensure Verra’s methodologies reflect the latest science and practices while aligning with jurisdictional GHG estimation procedures, Steve Zwick of Verra writes.
Read MoreCOMMENT: We must protect intact forests, but CORSIA got it wrong
While it is essential for the world to protect forests that are not under immediate threat of deforestation, treating carbon credits from their conservation as fungible compliance instruments threatens to undermine carbon market integrity, argue several consultants critical of UN aviation body ICAO’s recent decision to accept ART TREES carbon credits from jurisdictions under its CORSIA offsetting programme.
Read MoreCOMMENT: The voluntary carbon market needs ratings agencies
A new breed of ecosystem asset ratings agencies is needed to scale ecosystem markets. Their role is to fuse incentives in capital markets with conservation outcomes, and to generate huge opportunities for wealth creation, says Mani Gangadharan Venketachalam, President, BeZero Carbon.
Read MoreCOMMENT: Response to IETA Council Task Group on digital climate markets
As the largest player in this nascent space, we feel it is necessary to respond to some of the concerns communicated by the IETA task group on digital markets, as well as highlight important areas of collaboration and innovation moving forward, with the ultimate objective of scaling climate action, write two of the core members in crypto carbon outfit KlimaDAO.
Read MoreCOMMENT: IETA Council Task Group on digital climate markets – Key findings and recommendations
The International Emissions Trading Association will set up a Task Force to produce guidelines for the development of digital technologies for the carbon offset industry, including tokenised carbon credits, aiming to bolster the environmental integrity and transparency of the emerging digital carbon sector.
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